It is contended that those who have been bred at Eton, Harrow, Rugby, and Westminster, that the public sentiment within each of th...ose schools is high-toned and manly; that, in their playgrounds, courage is universally admired, meanness despised, manly feelings and generous conduct are encouraged: that an unwritten code of honor deals to the spoiled child of rank, and to the child of upstart wealth an even-handed justice, purges their nonsense out of both, and does all that can be done to make them gentlemen.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »

During medieval times, all those emotions were missing which have made us cautious and tentative in matters of justice: the insigh...t into diminished capacity, the concept of judicial fallibility, the awareness that society has to share in the blame for the guilt of individuals, the question whether an individual ought not be rehabilitated rather than made to suffer. Or, perhaps, better stated: a vague sense of all this is not lacking, but rather concentrates itself, unverbalized, in instant impulses of charity and forgiveness, unconcerned with the issue of guilt, which could suddenly break through the cruel satisfaction over the administration of justice. While we administer a hesitant, toned down justice, partially filled with a guilty conscience, the Middle Ages knew only two extremes: the full measure of cruel punishment or mercy.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »

Poetry is the supreme fiction, madame.Take the moral law and make a nave of it...And from the nave build haunted heaven. Thus,The conscience is converted into palms,Like windy citherns hankering for hymns.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »